Police used tear gas against demonstrators for the second consecutive day, after unguarded comments by a former interior minister ratcheted up tension ahead of elections

The director-general of the CBI employers' group warns that Treasury stinginess is making the charges for the government's National Employment Savings Trust too high

Paul Geddes, CEO of the Royal Bank of Scotland's insurance businesses, says the company is focusing on the turnround achieved in the first quarter and work needed for its sale

Investors in the UK gaming company are looking at a bid of 150p a share after the investment manager raised its stake to 41%, which triggers a mandatory offer to acquire the entire group

Government figures show total numbers in the first quarter of the year at 4,121 businesses, but research from Deloitte delivered a darker diagnosis of corporate health

The vehicle and accident management group says it expects a £25m shortfall in receivables, and yearly profits will fall below expectations, pulling its share price down to 4.6p

Jaguar Land Rover wants to recruit 1,000 engineers in the next two years to its UK operations as part of a £5bn plan to boost its position in the luxury end of the car business

The German and Spanish utilities discussed plans to form Europe's largest electricity generator, but dropped the €60bn deal over worries about shareholder and state reactions

The Aim-listed company's shares rise 2% on news that Iraq's central government has made its first ever payment for an oil export to Kurdistan's regional government

In the battle between these two extreme measures, the strongman approach nearly always wins but the drive towards hardness can be a gross over-simplification, writes Harry Eyres

The Liberal Democrats were left reeling from the double blow of a disastrous result in local elections coupled with looming defeat in their fight to change the country's voting system

Michael Mundaca's planned exit comes just as the Obama administration is considering whether to press forward with its own plan to transform the taxation of American businesses

The maker of high-tech rubber products gets boosted by strong demand for tubes used in dairy milking machinery, increasing pre-tax profits to £4.4m in spite of a fall in sales

Alan Brown, Rentokil Initial's CEO, was in less literary mood as he once again had to blame the messengers as the group announced widening losses at its parcel carrier business

The decline in profitability highlights how small Indian lenders have been battered by the crisis in Andhra Pradesh, where authorities ordered lenders to cease all operations

The announcement by the Lloyds chief executive to set aside £3.2bn to compensate customers who took out loan insurance cover usefully reinforces the scale of his challenge

The troubled mortgage finance group has reported a return to losses for the first quarter and has indicated that it is unlikely to earn more than the dividends owed to the US Treasury

The US-based clean water technology group, which floated on Aim in October, has signed a deal to supply the device to Bajaj Electricals, India's biggest home appliance company

A US senator is pressing the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority for information on ‘the potential scope of suspicious trading activity at SAC Capital’, the hedge fund run by billionaire Steve Cohen

Based on the latest attempt to forge a sustainable future for the Languedoc, Jancis Robinson fears that wine and French politics will never blend into one harmonious cuvée

Having foolishly offered to handle the raffle at their village's summer landmark event, Mrs Moneypenny whips her family into line to sell tickets

Most children today would turn up their noses at a concoction full of rhubarb and strawberries and topped with a cold milk pudding, says Rowley Leigh

Running a country on eloquence alone hasn't worked out disastrously for the UK's ruling classes – or at least not yet, writes Simon Kuper

The warm spring means it will be necessary to trick plants to stay in bloom. So much has come out so early that we now risk a blank in the best parts of the year, says Robin Lane Fox

Tyler Brûlé kicks off the month with a spectacular show at the Sign Café in Tokyo, which he says is a perfect place to get a snapshot of economic, social and cultural trends

In this age of internet shopping, Susie Boyt prefers going to an actual store with genuine human assistants who smile that smile that hits you like the iridescent rays of the sun

‘Pato’, which got its name because it used to be played using a live duck as a ball, is played with a football that is put inside a six-handled leather harness, writes Vicky Baker

The FT has partnered with boatbuilder Wally to stage a summer of superyacht racing, a series of five regattas in the Mediterranean. Tom Robbins watches it get under way

Users' guide: Rich Cohen has a facial at a men-only, upmarket salon in Manhattan while Deborah Copaken Kogan tests three eye creams that claim to fight against dark circles

When it comes to cosmetics, there are certain things you just don't need to spend money on. Emma Hill asks the expert insiders where to spend and where to save

The designer Slava Zaitsev is promoting new Russian talent through the Fashion Laboratory, a design school that supports 30 young hopefuls each year, writes Rachel Morarjee

Trot out your puppies in style in a showerproof mac with a padded herringbone collar and lead with leather details that will satisfy the needs of even the most discerning canine

To experience conflict is not to deal with an aberration, but a permanent fact of life we often do a good job of conveniently ignoring, writes Antonia Macaro and Julian Baggini

Paul Betts extends his test to two fashionable new-look French bistros, and discovers that the pudding sold in a busy and noisy Paris flea market tastes a lot better

Scientists have compiled a ‘sweat map’ of the human body and found out that the central and lower back showed unexpectedly high perspiration rates, writes Clive Cookson

The professor of Renaissance Studies tells Hester Lacey that although she has written a lot of books, she would like to write one that would stop people dead in their tracks

Highly nutritious and low in fat, insect protein is also efficient to produce – but will locusts and caterpillars catch on as a viable alternative to meat, asks Rebecca Seal

Geneva-based lawyer Enrico Monfrini has so far tracked down $1.3bn looted from Nigeria by its former dictator, General Sani Abacha – and is looking for more, writes Cole Moreton

From Georges de la Tour in Stockton-on-Tees to Giambattista Moroni in Dublin, the British Isles boasts a treasure trove of far-flung masterpieces, writes Christopher Lloyd

The world watched Japan in horror as explosions at a power plant provoked the worst nuclear accident in 25 years. Plant workers, inspectors and local residents tell their stories to Jonathan Soble and Mure Dickie

Most visitors seek out Cambodia's ancient shrines at Angkor Wat, but Sophy Roberts finds its 1960s architecture equally illuminating and deeply edifying

BBC controller Danny Cohen has said that they were putting out too much crime. After seeing this week’s splurge of new crime series, John Lloyd understood his reasoning

Gavin Turk’s first piece of public art is a huge rusty nail, a sculpture which grew out of his fascination with found objects evoking the idea of absence, says Jane Ure-Smith

Considerably improved since its rushed world premiere in 2009 in Minneapolis, this offering of Tony Kushner’s latest crackling epic retains the core of the first cast, says Brendan Lemon

His controversial hits have tackled immigration, climate change and terrorism, but playwright Richard Bean’s latest is a twist on 18th-century mores, writes Sarah Hemming

An intricate silver carriage clock made by Breguet in the 1870s for the Marquise de Bethisy, which has 10 'complications', is estimated to fetch up to SFr200,000, writes Simon de Burton

A number of highlight lots in the sales of Impressionist and Modern art in New York this week failed to find buyers and totals were under those made last year, says Georgina Adam

Edward St Aubyn provides an exquisite scrutiny of the aristocracy and its foibles in the elegantly written fifth instalment of his semi-autobiographical series

When G8 leaders gather in Deauville this month, they’re in for a treat in the French seaside town whose unintimidating sophistication is hard to beat, writes Carl Wilkinson

Jackie Wullschlager asks: can Paris regain momentum to become a 21st-century cultural centre and, if it does, will it change the way contemporary art is perceived?